Relation between Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Acute Infectious Gastroenteritis in Children

Abstract Background Post-infectious irritable bowel syndrome (PI-IBS) has been defined as a new onset of IBS following an episode of acute infectious diarrhea. Objective To determine the frequency of postinfectious irritable bowel syndrome (PI-IBS) among children who have an episode of acute infectious diarrhea. Subjects and Methods A case control longitudinal study was conducted on 93 children who fulfilled the criteria for diagnosis of acute infectious gastroenteritis. Patients were recruited from the Outpatient Clinic, Children’s Hospital, Ain Shams University, during a period of 6 months and were followed up for 3 months for the development of symptoms of IBS according to Rome IV criteria for diagnosis of IBS. They were compared to 100 age- and sex-matched controls who do not have history of acute infectious gastroenteritis during the last 3 months before enrollment. Result The age of studied cases ranged between (4-15) years old with a mean ±SD=9.26 ± 3.20 years. Females represented 61.3% of cases. PI-IBS occurred in 14%of cases with age ranged between (4-14) years old and females represented 61.5% of PI-IBS cases. Meanwhile, the incidence of IBS 3.2% of uninfected controls (relative risk, RR = 4.33). Most cases of PI-IBS were diarrhea prominent. There was no significant association with the causative organism identified among cases. Rota virus represented the most common organism among our patients with incidence of (32.3%) followed by campylobacter, salmonella, adeno virus, and giardia with incidence of (9.7%), (8.6%), (5.4%), (6.5%), respectively, while (37.6%) of patients have negative stool cultures for the mentioned organisms. Conclusion The frequency of PI-IBS is common among pediatrics but does not seem to be associated with the causative organism of the preceding episode of infectious diarrhea. Raising the awareness about this entity is of outmost importance as this will allow targeted treatment.